Barack Obama: The More Toys We Import From China The More Danger For Our Kids
Nothing says “Christmas” like a bit of holiday-themed hyperbole from a pandering, protectionist politician.
GREENFIELD, Iowa (AP) — As holiday shoppers hunted for safe toys Sunday, Democrat Barack Obama touted his plan for tighter regulation of Chinese-made playthings, millions of which have been recalled because of unsafe levels of lead.
Obama said he would test to find toys with lead-based paint and ban those with even trace amounts of the substance.
“Now don’t get me wrong, as president I will work with China to keep harmful toys off our shelves,” Obama said. “But I’ll also immediately take steps to ensure that all toys are independently tested before they reach our shores and I’ll significantly increase penalties on companies that break the rules.”
“The more toys we import from China, the more risk to our children,” said Obama, an Illinois senator. “As president I will act with urgency to protect our children from being harmed by unsafe toys.”
I’ve got two points to make:
First, do you have any idea how much more expensive toys would be if someone like Obama instituted independent testing for every toy coming into this country? A lot more expensive. And while the recent news reports about lead-painted toys from China making it into our markets are disturbing, are they really such a crisis (media sensationalism aside) that we need expanded government regulation and inspection? Which means huge new bureaucracies, more tax dollars spent and more expense for the toy makers. Which, in the end, means toys that cost a lot more than they did before.
All because a small fraction of the toys that come from China had lead based paint. Which sort of plays into my second point.
Obama’s soaring hyperbole about imports from China making us less safe has more to do with pandering to Big Labor than it does with a factual analysis of the situation. Like it or not, each and every day of your life you use dozens, if not hundreds, of products that are manufactured in China and you use them with little or no problems. Likely because if they were unsafe or unsatisfactory products, you wouldn’t have bought them. But Obama and the protectionists here in America (labor unions and the like) have latched onto this “lead paint” story not because lead paint is all that much of a problem, but because they want to do as much as possible to impede imports from China and thus your access to cheap, quality goods.
Obama doesn’t care about product safety. Or, at least, product safety isn’t his first concern here. Instead, the political sway held by left-wing labor groups is what he’s more concerned about.
